Times Gone By
by Demon-of-Asgard
Summary: A shadow of his former self, Sherlock hides in 221b, trying to escape an inescapable trauma. An unlikely visitor reveals the seemingly impossible, but will it be too little, too late? (I suck at summaries...) Also on ao3.


"You – you machine!"

"Do you even care about that?"

"Sherlock – wait!"

"Just be careful."

"That was the best thing I've done in my life!"

"Sherlock, where are you?"

"Don't."

"SHERLOCK!"

John Watson's words echoed round his head, as the once proud Sherlock Holmes sat alone. He looked down at his hands. Pale and veined, they shook slightly as the detective clenched and unclenched them.

_Too much drink _Sherlock thought. He had never drank before, but some of Greg Lestrade's last words to him were that beer can make the best medicine.

The Detective Inspector had left London, just like almost everyone else had done. Even Mrs Hudson was popping in less and less now; since she'd found a new partner in Derek Something-or-Other from up North, she'd done the unthinkable, in Sherlock's mind that was, and left Baker Street for the outskirts of Yorkshire. Her once pristine apartments were now all caked in dust, and her old and crackling radio had gone. No more daytime chatter, no more easy listening, no more raunchy comedy that she tuned into when she thought everyone else was asleep and couldn't hear. Sherlock had always believed he'd hated the sound. But to the suffocating silence that met his ears now was ten times worse.

Sherlock let his tired eyes flick up to the faded yellow smiley face on the black and white patterned wall. It was just beginning to blur in his vision.

"Not enough," Sherlock said to himself, in a low voice. He took another swig of the beer on his side table before getting slowly to his feet. The room spun around him, but he began walking, and kept walking until he could reach over and lean on the wall next to his spray paint and bullet hole art piece. He ran his long, crooked fingers over it. He tried to convince himself that all the memories returning to him in that instant were happy ones, of times when it was the two of them against the rest of the world. Fighting crime and saving the day. As john had put it, surprisingly fittingly, being Sherlock Holmes. But tears sprang to his eyes and rolled down his face with ease. They knew their way by now. Sherlock let his back slide down the wall, his chest heaving with quiet, repressed sobs. He couldn't breathe, but neither did he care.

"You're a very silly little boy…" Mycroft Holmes' voice, repeating an often used insult from back when he and his brother were both children, sounded even worse now than back then.

"You always say such horrible things…" Molly Hooper spoke now, her voice shrill with hurt and loathing. That was the only way she'd ever spoken to him in recent times, only becoming softer a few days before she left him. She'd taken a job somewhere in America, joking about how she was the real CSI, but stopping when Sherlock didn't laugh back. But then again, he never laughed back.

"You're weak, a coward…" Even he was there, Moriarty, with a voicemail message left when he'd first started the case of Reichenbach. He had no idea where he was now. He didn't care.

The words circled around his head, growing louder and louder, not letting him forget just some of the hundreds of people he had allowed to be hurt, reminding him who he was. His cries were loud and hoarse now, catching in his throat before he could expel them. Finally, after more of a struggle than he ever thought possible, he managed to choke out a few words.

"Not dead."

"It appears so."

Sherlock's eyes snapped open, still half sobbing. A man, clad in a torn suit and dirty trench coat, stood before him. The door and windows were still closed, leaving no explanation as to how he got in.

The detective staggered to his feet, and snatched up a loaded handgun from the table next to him.

"Stay calm. I do not come to hurt you," the man said, raising his hands. In the back of his mind, the part of him that still functioned as a consulting detective, Sherlock noted the American accent, the cut glass pronunciation and the absence of any slang.

"Who-" was all he could say.

"A friend."

"Don't have any. Not anymore."

"Sherlock, I know of your troubles, but-"

"You know who I am?"

"Yes."

"Then who are you?"

The man sighed, as if struggling with an internal battle. His face had a melancholy look that was always there, as if he'd spent most of his life pleading or praying.

Sherlock didn't lower his gun, despite the fact that his arms were visibly shaking, his hands were starting to ache and his knuckles were white around the handle. He clenched his jaw, and locked his brown eyes with the strangers blue ones. Sherlock tilted his head to the side, as if daring his opponent to remain quiet. Finally, the man spoke again.

"My name is Castiel. I'm an Angel of the Lord."

"Ha!" Sherlock sneered, "Angel? Angels don't exist. I should know."

"No. You should not know. You have no reason to. We haven't revealed ourselves willingly to anyone in Europe until this day. Your race is of no consequence to us, and right now, neither is your belief. But I am telling the truth. Whether you wish to accept it or not."

Sherlock laughed, but it wasn't humorous at all. It was more like a disbelieving bark. Sherlock hadn't been able to laugh truly in what seemed like years.

The man took a step forward, and in doing so caused Sherlock's nervous fingers to snap down onto the trigger of his gun. At point blank range, the bullet should've ripped straight through the man's - Castiel's – stomach, cut his spine in two, exited his body out his back and imbedded itself in the wall behind. But he had hardly flinched.

"Your gun will not harm me," Castiel said. His voice was quiet, but somehow it seemed to roll through 221b like thunder, and his eyes seemed to glow a brighter blue.

"I can prove to you who I am."

"Do it."

Castiel let his shoulders fall back, opening up his body. He relaxed and closed his eyes. The silence in the flat was only present for an instant, before the air began to crackle with static and the wooden floor boards shook and creaked. But when his eyes opened again, they emitted a piercing blue light, the streetlamps outside flickered violently and the very walls of the flat itself seemed to shiver.

But his shadow was far more impressive. Cast behind him were wings, skeletal but still feathered. There was no obvious source of where they came from, they were just there. And huge. Spreading across the back wall and up onto the ceiling, ever expanding and the most imposing thing Sherlock had ever seen.

"No…" The gun fell from his hands, as he backed away and pressed his back against the wall. Curling up into the foetal position, he brought his hands to his face, just as the light died away.

"Is that proof enough for you, my friend?" Sherlock looked up to see Castiel offering his hand. He took it, and the other man pulled him to his feet. As he did so, he put two fingers to the detective's forehead, and cleared his drunken vision.

"Why did you do that?" Sherlock asked, incredulously.

"I need you sober. I am about to tell you something that you may not wish to hear. Something that you may not want to know. But I need you to understand. For your own safety and the safety of this city, if nothing else." Sherlock looked Castiel up and down. He seemed calm enough at first glance, but an undeniable sadness seemed to radiate off him as the heat did from the morning sun.

"Tell… me… what?"

The Angel's gaze softened.

When he could, he'd left the Winchesters to deal with their own problems; they were capable of doing so, that much they had proved. Although it hurt him to do so, day and night he had told himself that he had a job to do. Moving everywhere, between dimensions and time, via every galaxy, he had searched for the man before him with every moment he could spare.

When he'd finally found Sherlock Holmes, he'd watched him from afar. He told himself that he had become the man's guardian Angel, despite never revealing himself to his charge. He'd seen the major events in his life, followed their stories and witnessed the after effects of them when they crashed down around him. But still he had done nothing. He'd watched the line of tragedies take its course, the line of tragedies that had turned the detective from a hero of London's streets to what stood before the Angel now; a quivering wreck, paranoid, depressed and only kept alive because he was too drunk and too tired to reach over and put a gun in his mouth. Castiel almost wanted to keep the information he had from him. His pain was great enough.

But he had a job to do. And he'd do it.

"Sherlock," he began. The detective twitched and tilted his head to the side, waiting for him to continue. "Sherlock. All the things that have happened to you – pain, heartbreak, loss – I am sorry my friend, but all of it happened for a reason."

Sherlock didn't react at first. He stared at Castiel, unblinking. The revelation didn't seem to register in his mind, but instead the words seemed to hang in the air, filling the silence without any sound.

"A reas-"

"Sherlock," Cas interrupted, "You're my brother. You're an Angel."

"I-"Sherlock tried to respond, to argue, to deny. But he couldn't. He strained to open his mouth and say 'No, I'm not an Angel. I can't be.' But he couldn't. His brain had accepted the fact without complaint, welcoming the truth home as a mother would her absent child. He barely registered that tears were rolling down his face again, until his legs had given way and he'd collapsed back down onto the leather sofa. His face and body were still, but he kept on crying.

"Brother-"

"No." Sherlock's voice was cracked and hoarse, but the anger in it was as open as the grief. His voice was still as clear as ever, but the harsh tone caused by the inescapable sadness he had been put through had changed it. It sounded more like the sound of a dying animal. It wasn't the voice of reason he was famed for anymore.

"Sherlock-"

"No. Don't. I'm not your brother. I am not your friend. I do not know you, yet you come here expecting me to follow your lead. You left me here, while all this happened, and what did you do?"

Castiel looked at his feet, hanging his head in shame and staying silent.

"Nothing. You did nothing. You just sat there, watching. When you could've helped. Until now."

"I – I am sorry."

"Why now though? Huh?" Sherlock challenged. "You waited all this time, to tell me something you knew would hurt, so why wait until now? Why wait until I'm broken?"

"I had no choice," Cas murmured.

"No choice? Everyone has choices. It's not using them; that's what makes bad things happen." Sherlock knew he sounded childish, but he had no control over himself. His voice was rising, and he felt a heat spread across his body. His fists were clenched and his throat was sore, but still he continued. "Evil comes from not caring when others are in pain. Turning your back on the needy."

"I had my orders."

"YOU COULD'VE SAVED HIM!" A scream burst forth from the detective's lips; a wild, animalistic scream that was so unlike the younger Holmes that deep down, he even shocked himself. He stood up, grabbed one of the many empty glasses and hurled it with all his might at Castiel. Due to his shaking arm, it sailed past the Angel and shattered harmlessly on the wall behind him. But still Sherlock continued.

"YOU WERE WATCHING ME FROM THE START, I COULD FEEL IT! YOU WERE THERE! AND YOU KNEW WHAT WOULD HAPPEN, YOU SAW IT HAPPEN! AND YOU BLAME ME!"

"I was not blaming-"

"SHUT UP! HE COULD BE HERE! HE COULD BE HERE IF YOU'D JUST HELPED ME!"

The lights in 221b were flickering as Sherlock's anger grew. Castiel stood there, unmoving and saddened, watching as the words he had spoken tore his brother apart. And he was right, of course. Cas could've helped, and should've. An immense guilt was gnawing away at his gut, as he watched the detective seemingly forget where he was, break down in anger and mutter and shout incoherently.

It seemed like hours until he calmed down, his screams dying to whispers in his throat. But those whispers, directed not at Castiel but at Sherlock himself, hurt the on looking Angel infinitely more than the insults flung at him. And he heard every single one.

"John, I'm sorry."

"This is all my fault."

"I should've told you."

"I need you, John."

"Come back."

"Just give me another chance, I'm begging you."

"You were right, about everything."

"Not dead."

Castiel approached with caution.

In his life, the only person he'd seen this way was Dean, after an argument that nearly got his younger brother, Sam, killed in a way that meant he couldn't come back. Cas had healed him just before he passed, but not before seeing the older Winchester more exposed and vulnerable than ever before. When his brother had awoken, he'd pulled Castiel into a bone crushing hug, thanking him over and over, not for saving Sam's life, but for saving the both of them. Cas had never forgotten that day, and had made a vow never to put his dearest friend through anything close to that amount of pain again.

But Sherlock held more power than Sam, Dean and Castiel himself combined into one.

In Heaven, he was an idol to every other Angel, even those that held a higher rank than him. His wit and intelligence was unequalled, and he became the go to deity when asking for wisdom in life.

But he was far too clever for his own good.

After trying to debate with Michael, God's most beloved Archangel, he had pushed his superior too far, and was cast down to Earth in disgrace. But still, he grew from a human child into William Sherlock Scott Holmes, one of the most cherished minds on the planet and continued doing good in to world.

Cas had heard the stories of his brother's fall. And he knew to fear his bother above almost any other.

"From the bottom of my heart," Castiel began, softly, "Sherlock, I am sorry. I now see that you are right. I should've helped. I wish I could've done something."

Sherlock drew a ragged breath, before turning his piercing bloodshot eyes to meet Castiel's.

"John Watson is dead. I tried to save his life by keeping secrets. But I failed at everything I tried. My brother, Mycroft Holmes, and the rest of my family abandoned me. My friends left me. And Dr Watson, veteran of Afghanistan and the best man I ever knew put a bullet in his head because I was so desperate to prove myself. I was so selfish. So stupid."

Before Castiel could stop him, Sherlock had retrieved his gun from the floor and pushed it under his own chin. But pulling the trigger had no effect. No blood sprayed the walls; no body slumped to the floor. Just a frustrated scream from the detective as he fired again and again until the gun was empty.

"Sherlock, just breathe. Breathe for me, please!" Cas pleaded, pulling the gun away and throwing it down the hallway. It clattered against the door to his bedroom and came to a stop, spinning on the polished floor. Sherlock made no attempt to stop him, instead just hiccoughing as Castiel stood by.

"When I jumped off that roof," he choked out, "I felt something. Something I'd never felt before. Like I was flying. Because that's what I was doing, wasn't I? And John, he didn't see, because he was too shocked."

Castiel managed a grief filled half smile, as he laid a hand on Sherlock's shoulder and guided him back down to the sofa.

"I loved him, Castiel," Sherlock continued, as he put his head down on one of the sofa cushions. "I loved him, and I sent him away." His words hit Cas like a punch to the gut, though he dare not let it show.

"He loved you too."

A half laugh, half sob left Sherlock, as he closed his eyes and shrank into the cushions. He curled up, brought his knees to his chest, let his hands cover his eyes and hid his tear stained face.

"Just go," he whispered. "Just leave."

Cas nodded.

"I will. But sleep. Sleep, brother."

Sherlock opened his eyes, just time to see the Angel approach. He felt the ghost of a touch of two fingers to his forehead, before he slumped back down and let a dreamless sleep consume him.

Sherlock awoke with the sun gleaming through a crack in the curtains straight onto his eyelids. The flat was clean; almost no indication of what happened last night was left. Castiel included, as he was nowhere to be seen.

Sherlock sat up, his neck sore from lying on the sofa for so long. If he fell asleep at midnight last night, he estimated that it was around midday now, meaning he'd spent a whole twelve hours under. Longer than he had in… ever.

His eyes scanned the flat, looking for anything to prove that the events of the night before were more than just a dark dream. He saw that he was in fact correct, as a few changes had occurred; at least half of the empty glass bottles were gone, as was his gun. And there was something else. Propped up against the skull on the mantelpiece was a folded piece of paper. It was torn and crumpled, as if it had been sat in a pocket for some time, waiting to be used. Blue ink was clearly visible on it, but Sherlock didn't unfold it.

_From him _he thought. He snatched it off the mantelpiece and crushed it into a ball in his fist, hoping that if he could get it small enough in his palm it would just vanish, cease to exist. He didn't want to think about Castiel, or the events of last night, or what had been revealed to him. He turned on his heel and opened the window, something he'd never done before. He let the crisp morning air ruffle his hair, as he looked onto the street below. He stretched out his arm, ready to drop the note and banish it from his mind.

_Wait._

In his life as a detective, working as the life line for the likes of both Scotland Yard and Private clients, he'd always told himself to consider everything, to waste nothing. If it seemed vaguely odd, it was an indicator of crime. Anything could be a lead, so everything he had to follow.

He'd tried to leave that version of himself behind; the Hat Detective with the internet following, a mind like a computer and a heart of stone. Not the vigilante that London wanted, but the one it deserved.

But he never could, not really. It was built in, wired into his very being. Curiosity was in his nature, and trying to deny that for more than a second was one of the most pointless things any person could do, including Sherlock himself.

Reopening the paper, he looked down, to see neat, slanting handwriting in dark blue ink. But he could tell in an instant that the little jumps in every written letter were there because the pen had been held by a shaking hand. There was sadness ingrained in those words.

But reading them, Sherlock felt nothing but a bittersweet joy. The four words hurt and healed him, and despite himself, he couldn't stop himself reading and re-reading them. His eyes brushed over every sweeping curve, every jump in the handwriting, and every ink splatter on the page. Tears threatened to spill over his cheeks once again, but for the first time in a long time they didn't fall. He was too happy.

After what felt to Sherlock like days, he placed the paper back open in the middle of the mantelpiece. He wanted to be able to see Castiel's final message to him whenever he wished, so he set about making them the centrepiece of the entire room. Those words would be the words that always lived in his mind, the words he woke up to in the morning and dreamed of at night, the words that finally made him leave the flat one December morning, and head back to Scotland Yard to pick up his next case. Those were the words that meant he'd keep going. Keep holding on:

_You're in_

_his Heaven._

Fin.


End file.
